(1) Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an automatic pet feeder. Specifically, the present invention is a water and pet food feeding machine, which provides water to a feeding bowl maintaining a constant water level, also it dispenses pet food on a set time interval at a predetermined quantity.
(2) Description of the Related Art
Oftentimes, we are away from home for work, school, or vacation. We do not spend enough time at home, which leads to neglect on our pets. If we are not home for a few days, then we can not feed our pets for a few days, our pets suffer from dehydration and hunger. Leaving excessive pet food does not solve this problem, because the unconsumed pet food spoils quickly. If we want to own pets, the least we can do is to feed them right, the right quantity at the right time. This is the basic requirement which can be an unbearable burden to many of us. The present invention will decrease this burden by feeding water and pet food to our pets for weeks at a predetermined quantity on a set time interval.
It is difficult to come by a reliable machine to feed our pets in a proper output. As the prior art, U.S. Pat. No. 5,003,925 to Robert John D, is a Fish Food Dispenser. The dry pet food is dispensed with half-cup scoop in the production line. The minimum serving for each dispense was half a cup with increments of half cup. In other words, the servings could only be ½, 1, 1½, 2 cup and so on with no other measurements in between. In real practice, the half cup increment of fish food will most likely miss the target badly for the desired quantity. The set quantity for dispensing controlled by the number of scoop of half a cup suffers significantly from inaccurate dispensing.
The feeding output monitored by a number of scoops has a similar inaccurate dispensing effect as the other methods that the feeding outputs monitored by the number of revolutions or the duration time for dispensing. As illustrated in U.S. Pat. No. 6,681,718, an Animal Feeding Device from Mcllarky, Scott Alan. “The urging member rotates for a duration or number of revolutions commensurate to the desired quantity of food to be dispensed at each feeding interval.” This device depends solely on the dispensing time or the number of revolutions to control the quantity of pet food to be dispensed. These are the unreliable trial and error methods. For every setting, multiple guesses are most likely taking places to make certain the outputs from the number of revolution or a dispensing time that may closely match the desired quantity. In such manner, it is difficult to dispense pet food to the exact desired outputs. This method cannot even maintain a constant feeding output at the same setting due to any tiny change of the dispensing condition.
Development of a device which can provide a predetermined weight of food to a pet at a predetermined time without the need for a feeding bowl represents a great improvement in the field of pet feeding and satisfies a long felt need of the pet owner.